The Manuscript Found in Saragossa (85 page)

‘You are not mistaken,' said Mamoun. ‘We'll go directly to dine with her.'

He opened a little secret door and I fell at the feet of my wife, who could not hide her own feelings.

She regained control of herself and said, ‘Don Juan, what I said to you at Sorriente had to be said once and for all because it is the truth, and my plans are irrevocable. But after you went away I reproached myself for my lack of tenderness. The inner instinct of my sex is repelled by behaviour which arises from heartlessness. Guided by this instinct, I decided to await you here and say goodbye to you one last time.'

‘Señora,' I replied to the duchess, ‘you have been, and still are, the only dream of my life and you will always take precedence over reality for me. Pursue your destiny by all means, and forget Don Juan for ever. But remember that I leave a child with you.'

‘You will soon see her,' said the duchess, ‘and together we will entrust her to those who will attend to her education.'

What more can I tell you? It then seemed to me and even now still seems to me that the duchess was right. Would I have been able to live with her, I who was her husband yet without being so? Even if our liaison had escaped the prying eyes of the public, it could not have remained hidden from the eyes of our household, and the secret could not have been kept for long. Perhaps the duchess's fate would have been entirely different. That is why it seemed to me that she was acting within her rights and so I gave in. I was to see my little Ondina,
¹
who was so called because she had only been baptized in a water and not anointed.

We met again at dinner. Mamoun said to the duchess, ‘Señora, I believe that Don Juan should be informed of certain things he needs to know. If you agree, I shall do this.'

The duchess gave her consent. Mamoun turned to me and said, ‘Señor Don Juan, you find yourself here on lands whose deep places are hidden from profane eyes; lands in which everyone has a secret to keep. There are vast caves and extensive underground workings in this chain of mountains. They are inhabited by Moors who have never left them since they were driven out of Spain. In the valley which stretches out before your eyes you will meet bogus gypsies, some of whom are Muslim, others Christian, yet others who confess no religion. On the pinnacle of that rock over there you can see a tower to the top of which a cross is fixed. It is a Dominican monastery. The holy Inquisition has its reasons for shutting its eyes to everything that goes on there, and the Dominicans make it their duty to see nothing. The house in which you find yourself is lived in only by Jews. Every seven years Portuguese and Spanish Jews gather to celebrate the sabbatical year.
²
This will be the four hundred and thirty-eighth time since Joshua celebrated it. I have already said, Señor Avadoro, that among the gypsies some are Muslims, some
Christians and some confess no religion. These last are pagans who are the descendants of Carthaginians. In the reign of Philip II,
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some hundreds of these families were burnt at the stake. A few only found refuge near a small lake of volcanic origin. The Dominicans have a small chapel there.

‘Now, Señor Avadoro, listen to what we have arranged for little Ondina, who will never know what her origins are. The duenna, who is completely devoted to the duchess, is taken to be her mother. A pretty little house is being built for your daughter beside the lake. Dominicans from the monastery will teach her the first principles of religion. For the rest, we shall trust to providence. No ferreting spy will be able to find his way to the shores of the lake of la Frita.'

As he spoke, the duchess shed some tears, and I too could not stop myself from crying. The following day we went to the shores of the same lake where we find ourselves today, and took little Ondina there.

Next day the duchess had recovered her pride and her haughtiness, and I confess that our farewell was not very affectionate.

I did not stay long at the castle. I took a ship, landed in Sicily and arranged with Captain Speronara to be taken to Malta.

I went to see Prior Toledo. My noble friend embraced me warmly, took me to a room well apart from the others and closed the door behind me. Half an hour later the prior's marshal brought me a copious meal and towards evening Toledo came with a great wad of letters, or as they say in political circles, of dispatches. The next day I was already on my way to the Archduke Don Carlos with a message.

I met his Imperial Majesty in Vienna.
⁴
Immediately I had handed over my dispatches, I was shut up in a room well apart from the others, as I had been in Malta. An hour later the archduke came to see me in person, took me to the emperor and said:

‘I have the honour to present to your Imperial and Apostolic Majesty Marchese Castelli, a Sardinian gentleman, and to ask that he be given the key of chamberlain.'

The Emperor Leopold twisted his lower lip into as pleasant an expression as he could manage, and asked me in Italian when I had left Sardinia.

I was not in the habit of speaking to monarchs, and still less of lying to them, so by way of reply I restricted myself to a deep bow.

‘Good!' said the emperor. ‘I hereby attach you to the household of my son.'

And so I became, without wishing to, Marchese Castelli, a Sardinian gentleman.

That evening I had a terrible headache, the next day a fever, and two days later smallpox. I must have caught it in some inn in Carinthia. My illness was violent and extremely grave. Yet I recovered from it, and even benefited by it. Castelli no longer looked in the least like Don Juan. In changing my name I had also changed my outward appearance. No one would ever have recognized in me the Elvira who once was going to become the wife of the Viceroy of Mexico. As soon as I was better, I was entrusted with communications with Spain. Meanwhile, Philippe d'Anjou was reigning in Spain, in the Indies and even in the hearts of his subjects. But heaven alone knows what demon intervenes at such moments in the affairs of princes. King Philippe and the queen, his wife, became, as it were, the first subjects of the Princesse des Ursins.
⁵
Moreover, the Cardinal des Estrées, the French ambassador, was admitted to the council of state, which enraged the Spaniards. Finally King Louis XIV, thinking that he could do as he liked, made Mantua a French garrison. The Archduke Don Carlos's hopes of acceding to the throne were rekindled.

One evening, right at the beginning of the year 1703, the archduke summoned me. He walked a few steps towards me and deigned even to embrace me affectionately. This greeting heralded something extraordinary.

‘Castelli,' said the archduke, ‘haven't you had news from Prior Toledo?'

I replied in the negative.

‘He was a remarkable man,' added the archduke after a moment.

‘What do you mean, “was”?' I exclaimed.

‘Yes,' said the archduke, ‘he was. Prior Toledo died of typhus on his island of Malta. But you will find in me a second Toledo. Mourn for your friend, and remain loyal to me.'

I wept bitter tears at the loss of my friend and realized that I had for ever to remain Castelli. By the force of destiny I became the docile instrument and the slave of the archduke.

Next year we went to London. From there the archduke went to Lisbon, while I joined the troops of Lord Peterborough,
⁶
whom I had had the honour of meeting in Naples. I was at his side when he secured the surrender of Barcelona and on this occasion he revealed his character by a noble and famous action. While the terms of surrender were being negotiated, some allied troops had entered the city and started looting it. The Duke Popoli, who commanded the army in the name of King Philippe, complained of this to the English lord.

‘Allow me to enter the city for a moment with my English troops,' said Peterborough, ‘and I give you my word that order will be restored.'

He did as he promised. He left the city and offered it honourable terms of surrender.

Soon after, the archduke, who had conquered nearly all of Spain, arrived in Barcelona. I regained my place in his household, still under the name of the Marchese Castelli. While walking one evening with members of the archduke's household in the main square, I saw a man whose gait – now crawling, now scuttling – reminded me of Don Busqueros. I had him watched, and was told that he wore a false nose and was known as Dr Robusti. I didn't doubt an instant that it was Busqueros, and that the wretch had slipped into the town with the intention of spying on us.

I informed the archduke of this, who gave me full powers to do as I saw fit with the villain. First, I ordered him to be locked up in our central guardhouse. Then, as the guard was being relieved, I lined up two ranks of grenadiers, each armed with a switch of birch, from
there to the port. The men were spaced apart so that they could move their right arm. When Busqueros came out of the guardhouse he at once realized that these preparations had been made for him, and that he was to be the king of the festivities, as we say. He ran as fast as he could and avoided half the blows but none the less received at least two hundred. At the port he threw himself into a longboat, which took him on board a frigate, where he had the leisure to tend to his back.